Young House Lovehttps://www.younghouselove.com
DIY Home Decorating Projects, Tutorials, & ShenanigansMon, 19 Mar 2018 05:00:56 +0000en-UShourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=4.9.42801401http://www.younghouselove.comhttp://www.younghouselove.com/wp-content/themes/Petersik-TYH%20Theme/images/YHL144x144Button.jpgYoung House LoveYoungHouseLovehttps://feedburner.google.com#89: A Year Without Shoppinghttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/YoungHouseLove/~3/B64T8-QtGuw/
Mon, 19 Mar 2018 05:00:56 +0000https://www.younghouselove.com/?p=85814<p>Could you put your wallet on lockdown for 365 days? Sherry shared the story of a woman who did, including why she took on the challenge, the few exceptions she allowed to make it possible, and how it’s inspiring us to adjust our spending&#8230; and maybe even try out a ban of our own. Plus, how much should you involve your kids in the design of their rooms? We share some tips and tactics for keeping everyone happy in the process, so the result is a room that they love (and that you also like to be in with them). Plus, the paint colors that will help your home sell for more money (some of</p>
<p>The post <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/03/podcast-89/">#89: A Year Without Shopping</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com">Young House Love</a>.</p>Could you put your wallet on lockdown for 365 days? Sherry shared the story of a woman who did, including why she took on the challenge, the few exceptions she allowed to make it possible, and how it’s inspiring us to adjust our spending… and maybe even try out a ban of our own. Plus, how much should you involve your kids in the design of their rooms? We share some tips and tactics for keeping everyone happy in the process, so the result is a room that they love (and that you also like to be in with them). Plus, the paint colors that will help your home sell for more money (some of them surprised us!) and a DNA test that led to a humbling personal discovery.

You can download this episode from Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, TuneIn Radio, and Spotify – or listen to it below! Then use this page to check out any links, notes, or photos we referenced. Note: If you’re reading in a feed reader, you might have to click through to the post to see the player.

What’s New

You can also follow Cait on her website, where she has some ongoing resources for people looking to follow in her footsteps.

If you want to grab one of the AncestryDNA tests that we did, they’re selling for $79 on Amazon right now. It takes about 8 weeks to get your results back, so just be ready to be patient.

Or you can just try searching for old relatives without testing your DNA first over at Ancestry.com (they offer free trials to access their database of old documents so you can attempt to construct a family tree).

Paint Color Quiz

Here’s Zillow’s 2017 Paint Color Analysis, which includes a chart of all of the colors from last year that helped houses sell for more than expected (and the ones that caused them to sell for less).

You can also check out the 2016 report to see what has changed or listen to Episode #24 to hear how Sherry quizzed me on that year’s data.

Sherry also promised some of her favorite sale-friendly wall colors that we’ve used frequently, so here they are:

Listener Question

If you want a peek at how our daughter’s room has evolved, you can scroll through this post that documented its progression. That post doesn’t include it’s most recently evolution (shown above), but it’s detailed in this more recent post.

In both of those rooms, you can see how we did neutral walls (Going To The Chapel by Benjamin Moore in our son’s room, White Heron by Sherwin Williams in our daughter’s room) but added color and fun with accents like bedding, accessories, and paint on surfaces like the ceiling (in our daughter’s room) or both of their closet doors.

And if you check out this post, we actually detail (and show video!) of how we got our daughter involved in one of the design elements of her room back when we was 3. So tiny!

Also, this is that closet with the desk that she requested recently (and helped me put together). Although this photo is from back before we got her a pink chair (that’s a borrowed dining chair below) and later added the rug underfoot when she noticed it was colder in that corner. Note: see how we covered that back wall in fabric here.

We’re Digging

That’s sister-and-brother-team Leann & Steve from Restored By The Fords above, in a space that kinda exemplifies what Sherry was describing in the episode. I mean the gold swan certainly wasn’t something we saw coming…

Sounds like their current season is complete, so you should be able to binge it on demand – and they just got greenlit for season 2, so they’ll be back in 2019.

And if you or the guy in your life is interested in checking out Wohven, the t-shirt subscription service I mentioned, I’ve been pretty impressed with the quality of them (versus what I typically wear which is usually Target, Old Navy, or free shirts from the various races I run). You can choose the size, the neckline (crew or V-neck), and plain ($9) or graphic tees ($11). Below are some samples of their designs:

]]>85814https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/03/podcast-89/Updated Beach House Tour!http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/YoungHouseLove/~3/pu_nZ6zCHR4/
Wed, 14 Mar 2018 16:57:36 +0000https://www.younghouselove.com/?p=85801<p>Although we&#8217;ve been sharing lots of little peeks of our beach house progress on social media, John and I realized it has been nearly THREE WHOLE MONTHS since we gave you a full tour of everything (since this video tour from back in December!). And not only have there been some big projects since then, like building in a pantry and constructing the bunk beds, there have also been a flurry of smaller updates that we haven&#8217;t posted about at all &#8211; some that we completed as recently as this past weekend. And thus, this post was born. similar chandeliers / dining chairs (ours are &#8220;gray&#8221;) / marble &#8220;vase&#8221; / range hood / glass pendants As usual, I&#8217;ll kick</p>
<p>The post <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/03/updated-beach-house-tour/">Updated Beach House Tour!</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com">Young House Love</a>.</p>Although we’ve been sharing lots of little peeks of our beach house progress on social media, John and I realized it has been nearly THREE WHOLE MONTHS since we gave you a full tour of everything (since this video tour from back in December!). And not only have there been some big projects since then, like building in a pantry and constructing the bunk beds, there have also been a flurry of smaller updates that we haven’t posted about at all – some that we completed as recently as this past weekend. And thus, this post was born.

As usual, I’ll kick off the post with the video tour because it’s the easiest way to get the full update on everything (if you scroll past it and check out the pics, you’ll get a general gist… but no amount of photos + words can compare to a moving video through a space – and I dive into a lot of bonus stuff in the video just because I like to flap my gums). Oh but we realized afterward that, most likely due to my aforementioned propensity to jabber, I forgot to walk into the mudroom and the downstairs bathroom – but the mudroom is basically just a holding room for our tools and scrap wood right now, and the downstairs bathroom looks the same as the last time we shared video footage, so you’re not missing much. Anyway, the rest of the house is covered, so you can get a detailed wak-through of the progress we’ve made (and the areas that are still, shall we say, lacking) right here in the video. Note: if you are viewing this in a feed reader you may need to click through to the post to see the video. You can also watch it here on YouTube.

If you can’t dive into the video quite yet, I’ll give you some highlights via photos (the video has a lot more POVs though). First is the project that John was surprisingly enthusiastic about since it has been a long time coming: finally putting a top on the secondhand coffee table that I found for $5 on a local buy/sell/trade group. Up until now, you’ve probably stared curiously at that strange octagonal cage that floats around aimlessly in the middle of the living room, just begging to no longer live her life topless and alone. You can see it below in this photo from way back in October when we first moved in furniture (before we switched out the light fixture for something larger with more light, added a rug, and hung curtains).

We’ve been attempting to get a top for it for MONTHS now. First I got a few quotes for having an octagon-shaped marble or quartz top cut for it, but they were staggeringly expensive (as in more than $500 and sometimes more than $800 – even for remnant slab pieces) so that was out. But we were set on the idea of a light colored stone look, just because the rug and the couch are dark and we want to break things up with something nice and light in the middle. Then we realized we could create a white concrete top that would do just that if we built a wood top and used Ardex feather finish to skim coat it for that solid white concrete look – sort of like we did to our old kitchen counters. We love that it’ll end up being lighter & easier to move since it’s just a veneer of concrete, and we’ve never used the white concrete feather finish yet, so we’ll definitely keep you posted when we get to that step. So far we’ve just constructed the wood top:

Also in the living room, you may have heard us debating several pink chairs on our podcast (and previewing them as they came in and immediately left on InstaStories – ha!). We kept coming back to the fact that this cane chair that we’ve had for years was a better fit than anything else we could find. And I swear it’s much more comfortable than it looks (let me tell you, John “Practical” Petersik does not tolerate uncomfortable chairs for purely decorative purposes) so that’s a legit endorsement to give cane chairs a chance and just sit in them to see if they’re really bad or really good.

I just added a seat cushion that I found at Pier 1 (the flamingo pillow is from HomeGoods years ago) and it’s starting to look right at home. I only wish we could find another identical chair so we could have a matching pair in there. We found this one at a thrift store ages ago, so maybe someday one will pop up on Etsy or something? This weekend we also got to hang some big art to anchor a large empty wall in our kitchen. It’s from Urban Outfitters of all places, and it was perfect in just about every respect: the theme (it’s an aerial photo of the sea meeting a sandy beach), the color scheme (pink + blue), and the price ($199 for a giant 30 x 40″ print that comes framed!). The fact that the natural wood frame is so similar to our 100-year-old pine floors was a pretty exciting revelation for me when it arrived. It also comes in other sizes and other frames and it’s 20% off right now if you’re in the market for some art.

You’ve may have also noticed that we finished hanging curtains downstairs (extra long curtains + 9′ ceilings are great for bringing the eye up and emphasizing the added height) and I finally got around to hemming them all this weekend. We have been buying Lenda curtains from Ikea, washing them to pre-shrink them, and then cutting off the tabs before clipping them up. Some still need more steaming but we finally found a steamer that does the trick (after returning another one that did not do a thing). This Mac daddy upright one from Target was the winner. But even if some of our curtains are a little creased, they make the house feel so much more complete and oh so beachy. Long breezy white curtains FTW!

We also got our new cabinet installed where the mini-fridge used to be (over the last few months we realized we never used it and decided more cabinetry and counter space there is so much better than a secondary fridge) and we also finished adding the cabinets along the right wall of the walk-in pantry. They’re shallow 15″ cabinets, just like the ones flanking the back door in the kitchen, so it’s really nice to have them continue in there.

Assembling and hanging the cabinets wasn’t hard (we built them one Friday night and installed them the next Saturday morning) but we always forget all the little dangling to-do list items after that, like adding the hardware, cutting new counters, and reinstalling the baseboards and toe-kicks. We finally got that done this past weekend. They just need some paint touch ups and they’ll be 100% completed. Have I mentioned the pantry is one of my favorite rooms in the entire beach house and I wish so badly I had one in our kitchen at home? That pendant is original and we had it rewired so it’s all safe and updated. (*Insert dreamy lovestruck sigh here*). Note: you can see how we built the shelves along the left wall of the pantry here.

We’re still assuming that not all of this room will be dedicated to food storage since it’s just a weekly vacation rental (but we do hear that people bring lots of those large boxes of cereal and chips and even things like beach coolers, so it’s nice to have a spot where those things can all live). We also think it may become useful for overflow kitchenware (extra dishes, cooking gadgets, etc) and even some extra towels or linens, since the house doesn’t really have a proper linen closet anywhere. Time will tell! We’re just grateful to have concealed storage space to spare.

As for upstairs, if you caught our podcast show notes a few weeks ago, you’ve already seen most of the bedroom progress. We got more of those breezy white curtains up everywhere (these still badly need to be steamed) and they really help anchor the rooms and make them feel softer.

That picture above is the front bedroom, and before when there was just a wide headboard sitting in front of that skinnier-than-the-bed window it felt kind of odd and unfinished. But once we hung the curtains it was immediately so much more balanced and finished looking. So if you have a room that necessitates that bed-in-front-of-the-window placement (the only other free wall in here has two windows, so the bed needed to be in front of a window any way we sliced it), consider adding some curtains hung high and wide on a nice substantial rod. Really makes a huge difference.

The middle bedroom has sort of a warm/brass thing going on. It started with the lamps, then I added some of my favorite gold frames with handmade prints that I picked up at a local craft fair last year, and we even hung a mobile in one corner. I can’t explain how simple this room was to put together (matching side tables, matching lamps, two pictures, simple curtains, neutral headboard and bedding, etc) but it feels so serene and beachy. The breezy gold mobile is like the icing on the cake.

The back bedroom, which is where we sleep when we stay there, also got curtains and otherwise has just seen some small tweaks: we lowered the sconces and simplified all the stuff on/under the night stands (there were baskets under them, and some leaning frames and books and stuff on top). I keep saying this, but the beach house is SO SIMPLE and such a nice breath of fresh air to us – so I didn’t want to lose that feeling by piling in too much stuff.

All of those less covered surfaces at the beach house are inspiring me to pare down at home, too! You know that simple, uncluttered, uncomplicated feeling you get in a nice hotel room? We have that at the beach! And now I’m greedy and want it at home. Why not?! If less works out there, can’t it work at home too? Of course we have backpacks and schoolwork and a home office here at home, so it won’t quite be the same, but needless to say, there are a lot of things getting donated or put in some large plastic bins labeled “duplex decor” at home, just to thin things out around here too.

Back to moving the sconces for a second, because we get questions about them every time we show them. Thankfully, moving them was super easy since we designed them with Shades of Light to just be plug-in (so it doesn’t require an electrician to move them and they only make a few small screw holes in the wall that can be speckled if you change their location). There isn’t a junction box behind them or anything – they literally just need to be plugged into the wall to turn on, and then they’re just hung on the wall like you’d hang a mirror or a picture. That’s it, and they’re all “installed” – so easy.

The only other big accomplishment this past weekend was locking in a plan for the backyard, including the size and placement of a shed, choosing a material for a patio, and nailing down a strategy for a nice but not too expensive pathway from the street to the back (it’s like 100 feet long!). But that, my friends, is a conversation for another day and another post…

P.S. To see other beach house posts as we’ve pulled this vacation rental together over the last year, click here. And for all of the paint colors and sources for every last room in the beach house, here’s a page full of that info.

]]>85801https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/03/updated-beach-house-tour/#88: Whatever Happened To Privacy In The Bathroom?http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/YoungHouseLove/~3/ky-3Smyoypo/
Mon, 12 Mar 2018 05:00:17 +0000https://www.younghouselove.com/?p=85746<p>Doorless bathrooms? Toilets behind glass walls? Showers and tubs just sitting in the corner of the bedroom? These “open concept” bathroom trends seem to be showing up more often, and they’re alarming to some and exciting to others. So this week we attempt to understand what sparked this growing trend, and we explain where we land on the bathroom privacy spectrum. Also, Sherry concocts a new date night idea for DIY enthusiasts and I recap how a few months off of social media has affected me (for better and for worse). Plus, how our very own half-bathroom installation went terribly, terribly wrong. You can download this episode from Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, TuneIn Radio, and Spotify – or listen to</p>
<p>The post <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/03/podcast-88/">#88: Whatever Happened To Privacy In The Bathroom?</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com">Young House Love</a>.</p>Doorless bathrooms? Toilets behind glass walls? Showers and tubs just sitting in the corner of the bedroom? These “open concept” bathroom trends seem to be showing up more often, and they’re alarming to some and exciting to others. So this week we attempt to understand what sparked this growing trend, and we explain where we land on the bathroom privacy spectrum. Also, Sherry concocts a new date night idea for DIY enthusiasts and I recap how a few months off of social media has affected me (for better and for worse). Plus, how our very own half-bathroom installation went terribly, terribly wrong.

You can download this episode from Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, TuneIn Radio, and Spotify – or listen to it below! Then use this page to check out any links, notes, or photos we referenced. Note: If you’re reading in a feed reader, you might have to click through to the post to see the player.

What’s New

Here’s a sneak peek of the house Sherry mentioned staging in this episode (the one where we all got together with more of an evening approach). After we recorded this episode it went up for sale and sold within 12 hours!

Sherry also talked about her other staging projects at the start of Episode #41 and Episode #53. You can click those links to see more photos like the before & afters below too.

You can also hear the original discussion of my attempts to detox from my phone (and how I first discovered the Moment app) in Episode #75. I finally purchased the Premium version (for $3.99) so I gained access to the 14-day boot camp, which gave me some new ideas beyond the free “Bored & Brilliant” course that I did back in December.

That’s Embarrassing

The photo above shows the console sink that we had a rough time installing. Signature Hardware doesn’t sell this exact model anymore, but you can find some similar ones on this page.

Below (left) is how the bathroom first looked when we bought it, and the picture on the right shows how we did a quick paint-and-accessories update before embarking on our full-fledged renovation a few years later.

Again, we don’t have great documentation of this remodel because it was while we weren’t blogging. But here I am coyly in the midst of demo. Clearly I wouldn’t have been jovially pausing to make this ridiculous face if I knew what was ahead of us…

And here’s the room with everything gone (except for my shoes, apparently). Fun fact: we didn’t replace any plumbing, we just spray painted the black PVC pipes with silver spray paint to make them look better since they’re now exposed.

Here I am hooking everything up after we solved the traumatic leg-related fiasco. Do I look relieved?

As I so subtly mentioned in the episode, there’s more about this room’s makeover in our second book, Lovable Livable Home.

Listener Question

I also had to laugh when I dug up this photo from way back in 2012 of the other hotel we mentioned from our Toronto book tour stop (still not sure of its name). We remembered the glass shower had blinds, but I’d forgotten that they were on the outside of the shower – so the person in the shower wasn’t in control of whether they stayed closed! HA!

If you want to do some further reading about “open concept bathrooms,” here’s what we dug up (all with great pictures & more examples):

And lastly, a big thank you to Universal Furniture for sponsoring this episode. You can enter to win $5,000 in new bedroom furniture at UniversalFurniture.com/YHL now through March 26th. Remember, the last winner of their previous dining room giveaway was a YHL-HAP podcast listener, so it could be you this time!

]]>85746https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/03/podcast-88/Brainstorming The Beach House Backsplashhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/YoungHouseLove/~3/uYDqAQ-jstQ/
Wed, 07 Mar 2018 15:13:15 +0000https://www.younghouselove.com/?p=85723<p>With most of our functional building projects done at the beach house done &#8211; like the walk in pantry and the freshly constructed bunk beds (remember when we almost had to tear those down right after we built them?) &#8211; we&#8217;re starting to turn our attention to some of the big aesthetic projects that are still on our list. This means you kitchen backsplash! sconces / hood / stools / hardware / shelves / pendant lights / faucet That photo above is a few weeks old (before we swapped out the mini fridge for more counter space) but it&#8217;s an important picture because it&#8217;s what Sherry and I have been using to imagine what the room&#8217;s future backsplash should</p>
<p>The post <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/03/subway-tile-backsplash-ideas/">Brainstorming The Beach House Backsplash</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com">Young House Love</a>.</p>With most of our functional building projects done at the beach house done – like the walk in pantry and the freshly constructed bunk beds (remember when we almost had to tear those down right after we built them?) – we’re starting to turn our attention to some of the big aesthetic projects that are still on our list. This means you kitchen backsplash!

That photo above is a few weeks old (before we swapped out the mini fridge for more counter space) but it’s an important picture because it’s what Sherry and I have been using to imagine what the room’s future backsplash should look like. For reference, the far end of the kitchen is looking a bit more like this now (although even this is outdated because we added the cabinet hardware last week, but ran out of time to take an updated photo).

Anything too trendy or too bold felt out of place in this old home, so we fought the little voice telling us to try something “exciting” or “new and different” and stuck with our gut. Call it expected. Call it boring. Call it Missy “Misdemeanor” Elliott. We just couldn’t deny that it felt like the classic, casual, and unfussy kitchen we were aiming for. You know, one that works in an 100 year-old house, like one of those cool old restaurants downtown (the same ones that might have a mosaic tile bathroom like the one we laid upstairs).

So really the only conundrum became WHERE do we put the subway tile? Do we do just a standard 18″ backsplash above the counter? Do we go all the way to the ceiling? Do we wrap it around the entire room?? Does it go into the pantry??? Where does the madness stop!?!

Anyone who has followed our past kitchen remodels knows that we’re big fans of tile that goes to the ceiling. We did that in our last house and in our current kitchen:

We also made a last minute decision to continue the tile around the door to the garage (floor to ceiling) because it visually connected all of the cabinetry better and made more of a statement.

I say all of this just to remind you that we typically err on the side of ALL THE TILE versus some small strip of it somewhere – even if it takes us days to complete said tile (and while we’re doing it we find ourselves seriously questioning our sanity).

But we do like to plan it out beforehand, just to be sure we’ll like it after putting in all of those hours. Fortunately, our good friend Photoshop “Misdemeanor” Elliott has come to the rescue. I just found a white subway tile pattern on Google and repeated it a few times to create an image that I could layer over that photo of the beach house kitchen (using the Perspective and Skew transform functions to match the angle of the walls). We’re not sure how dark we’ll go with the grout (definitely not black, but probably a medium gray) so this was close enough:

So without further ado, I present to you, several of the options we considered and the (surprising – even to us!) decision we landed on.

Option 1: No Backsplash

Okay, this wasn’t really a seriously considered option, but I included it because we did make the decision to forgo a backsplash in our first kitchen remodel and we’ve regretted it ever since. It would’ve been such an easy way to bring some polish to that kitchen, but we were still early in our DIY days and I think we were intimidated (and a little strapped for budget too). But now we know it’s not hard or even that expensive to pull off (here’s a tutorial for how we added a backsplash in my aunt’s house for under $200!) so we’re excited to install one here – especially after seeing it come to life in photoshop. So… onward!

Option 2: Up To The Hood

Let’s start with the smallest option. Since we don’t have upper cabinets, finding a natural stopping point for the backsplash was our main challenge. We knew a standard 18″ backsplash would probably look too low in such a lofty room (the ceilings are 9′ downstairs at the beach house) and we also thought it might look even more awkward with the extra-tall back panel of our range sitting in front of it (it’s around 10″ above the counter).

We also briefly considered just going to the bottom of those lower shelves, but we thought that too might seem like an awkward room proportion (almost exactly halfway up the wall), so we landed on the idea to tile up to the bottom of the hood/top shelf, which we mocked up above. We were charmed by its simplicity, but it felt a little incomplete and we weren’t crazy about the top shelves not having tile behind them. Have we mentioned we like a whole lotta tile?!

Option 3: Up To The Hood + Back Wall

One alteration that immediately felt better to us was extending the tile along the back wall. It would really emphasize that those shallow storage cabinets are part of the kitchen, even if they’re not connected to the main cooking space. We don’t really anticipate any major prep or water-splashing taking place back there (the counters are only 17″ deep) so we don’t functionally need a backsplash there, but visually we think it’s a big improvement that adds balance to the room.

Option 4: To The Ceiling

Next we skipped ahead to the idea that we thought would end up being the winner: going all the way to the ceiling. Again, we’ve done it in our last two kitchens and we’ve always liked the visual impact. And since this would be our first kitchen renovation with nine foot ceilings, the prospect of going all the way up was extra exciting (come to think of it, maybe we’re addicted to tile? Do we need a support group?). But we did want to try one other thing, just to be sure this option was our favorite…

Option 5: To The Ceiling + Stairway Triangle

For a hot second we wondered: should we go even bigger and tile the bottom of the back staircase too? Part of us thought it was kinda baller (yes, I said it) to wrap that bump-out in tile, and we thought it might help to downplay the big triangle slicing through the back wall. But we realized it would be tough to actually pull off (getting the angles to all lineup, tiling on a slanted surface, etc) and the more we stared at it, it began to look like overkill. Looking at the rendering above helped us realize that tiling “the nook” behind the staircase bump-out seems more natural than covering the bump-out itself. Thanks Photoshop!

So at this point, our favorite option was #4 – going to the ceiling, but not doing that big triangle. This one, if you don’t feel like scrolling back up a few pics:

Except we were still bothered by one thing that wasn’t really apparent in our mock-ups, but we knew could be especially weird in real life: the tile’s stopping point on that left-hand wall. Since the kitchen and the dining room share one big open room, if I had stepped back more to take the photo above, you’d see that there’s a lot more wall (over 12 feet!) to the left of that doorway. Can you picture how that vertical bullnose I rendered at the top of the doorway below would look weird if the whole left side of the room was just left untiled?

Just picture this gleaming white floor-to-ceiling tile arbitrarily stopping two thirds of the way down the wall. No bueno. We thought it would be really weird in person to have a wall that’s partially tiled, without any break or bend or natural stopping point for the tile to terminate.

Although we love floor to ceiling tile, we like it when it feels like it’s installed within a nook or space with clear-cut boundaries (like wall corners or floor to ceiling cabinets, which were our stopping points in both our last house and our current kitchen). We realized we don’t have any recent photos of that angle because the dining room walls are still empty and we apparently have avoided photographing it (I’ll try to get one when we’re there this weekend). This is the best one I could dig up, which was right after drywall went up:

We briefly discussed continuing the tile along that entire left wall to the end, but realized that it would not only read as a ton of tile (floor to ceiling without any cabinets under it to break it up!), it just isn’t a good choice for us because we want the kitchen to feel defined from the dining space thanks to the tile. In a big open floor plan with a dining space + a living space, it’s nice to have visual cues that define each area – like a backsplash in the kitchen zone and a big rug under the dining table, for example.

Since we couldn’t get behind our usual tile-to-the-ceiling method in this space, and the first couple of options felt a bit incomplete, we mocked up one last option just for shots and goggles. We actually assumed we’d both hate it, but at least we’d eliminate one more idea…

Option 6: To The Doorways

Miracle of all miracles, stopping the tile between the upper part of the doorways in our little Photoshop rendering actually looked a lot less awkward than we expected – in fact, we instantly warmed up to it because it basically gives us the best of both worlds. It’s more substantial than stopping under the hood (and brings the tile up behind those top shelves like we wanted!) but it gets the advantage of using the doorways as natural stopping points (which means the tile gets to terminate into an edge like we wanted – and it will help to define the kitchen space from the dining space!).

The precise height is still TBD since we’ll probably want a full tile at the top and my mock-up isn’t necessarily to scale, but we were both surprised by how much we liked this solution. It feels like it suits the space and the house really well – classic, casual, and not too try-hard… even if we did have to try hard to come to this conclusion.

Now I know many of you probably landed on other favorites as you saw them – and I do think all of them have their pros and cons. So I thought it would be fun to round out this post with a GIF of them all in one spot:

Our last challenge (besides actually doing the tiling) is picking the exact white subway tile we want to use. We leaning towards just the basic 3 x 6″ subway you can get at Lowe’s or Home Depot (that’s what we used in our first home’s shower and really loved it) but we’re sticklers for white undertones so we have to get a few samples to make sure we land on the one that looks best with our cabinets. Suggestions for your favorite subway tile are welcome!

P.S. For everything from beach house paint colors to where we got furniture & accessories, we created this page to help you find all of that info. We also have one for our house.

]]>85723https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/03/subway-tile-backsplash-ideas/#87: Lessons From The Messiest Homes In Americahttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/YoungHouseLove/~3/JKGZbUxFl7o/
Mon, 05 Mar 2018 06:00:37 +0000https://www.younghouselove.com/?p=85688<p>It’s never fun to get a call saying that you have to tear down something that you just SPENT AN ENTIRE WEEKEND CONSTRUCTING, but that’s exactly what happened with our beach house bunk beds. So this week we’re sharing what went down behind the scenes, and what we did to get around it. Plus, we’re talking to Matt Paxton who&#8217;s one of the extreme cleaning experts from the A&#38;E show Hoarders, and he sheds a ton of light on why people hoard, how you can help someone who does, and what tricks he has picked up for keeping his own home in order. Sherry’s also diving deeper into the woo-woo waters, I&#8217;m loving a certain</p>
<p>The post <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/03/podcast-87/">#87: Lessons From The Messiest Homes In America</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com">Young House Love</a>.</p>It’s never fun to get a call saying that you have to tear down something that you just SPENT AN ENTIRE WEEKEND CONSTRUCTING, but that’s exactly what happened with our beach house bunk beds. So this week we’re sharing what went down behind the scenes, and what we did to get around it. Plus, we’re talking to Matt Paxton who’s one of the extreme cleaning experts from the A&E show Hoarders, and he sheds a ton of light on why people hoard, how you can help someone who does, and what tricks he has picked up for keeping his own home in order. Sherry’s also diving deeper into the woo-woo waters, I’m loving a certain non-power tool, and our whole family is cracking up over a recent game-related discovery.

You can download this episode from Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, TuneIn Radio, and Spotify – or listen to it below! Then use this page to check out any links, notes, or photos we referenced. Note: If you’re reading in a feed reader, you might have to click through to the post to see the player.

What’s New

That’s not the new window in the photo above (although the new window looks pretty much identical to this one with the blinds down), but this old photo at least gives you a sense of the window we’re talking about. It’s not one of those obviously tiny ones, which is why it got by everyone until the very end.

If you’re looking for more details about how we built the bunk beds themselves, we wrote up a whole post about them a couple of weeks ago.

And if you want more details about our other hurdles with the historic review board and the duplex, we covered that in this post, as well as an update in podcast Episode #83.

Matt Paxton, Extreme Cleaning Expert from Hoarders

Below I’m also including a “highlights” reel of Matt’s time on Hoarders if you want a refresher on some of the extreme situations he has encountered during his time on the show.

And as Matt mentioned, hoarding is a serious condition that takes more than just “cleaning” to resolve. If you or someone you know needs help, A&E (the network where Hoarders airs) has an extensive list of treatment resources on its website.

Lastly, if you want more cleaning and organizing tips in podcast form, check out these past episodes:

And lastly, a big thank you to West Elm for sponsoring this episode. They’re celebrating International Women’s Day this Thursday, March 8th with in-store events across the country and a special IWD bag that donates $5 to Girl Up, an international United Nations charity that promotes gender equality. Learnhow West Elm celebrates and supports women every dayand look up your closest store to RSVP for this Thursday’s celebration.

]]>85688https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/03/podcast-87/A Duplex Demo Tour (Before & After Pics + A Video!)http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/YoungHouseLove/~3/UdpVdeACNEc/
Wed, 28 Feb 2018 14:08:36 +0000https://www.younghouselove.com/?p=85653<p>We finally got there guys &#8211; and not without a few notable setbacks. But that might be why it feels extra good to finally say: the duplex is officially demo&#8217;d! And today we&#8217;re going to show you around (in photos and even on video) and share some of our plans for this beast. We learned from doing the pink house that when a house has this much moisture damage, it&#8217;s best to take all of the walls down so there&#8217;s no mystery about what kind of mold/decay/structural issues are lurking back there. And considering the duplex already had several troubling spots that were blatantly obvious before demo (see the black mold spots on that side wall</p>
<p>The post <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/02/duplex-demo-tour/">A Duplex Demo Tour (Before &#038; After Pics + A Video!)</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com">Young House Love</a>.</p>We finally got there guys – and not without a few notable setbacks. But that might be why it feels extra good to finally say: the duplex is officially demo’d! And today we’re going to show you around (in photos and even on video) and share some of our plans for this beast.

We learned from doing the pink house that when a house has this much moisture damage, it’s best to take all of the walls down so there’s no mystery about what kind of mold/decay/structural issues are lurking back there. And considering the duplex already had several troubling spots that were blatantly obvious before demo (see the black mold spots on that side wall and that ceiling caving in from moisture damage?), we knew a full gut job was the prudent first step here. Spoiler: we also found lots of bad framing, bad wiring, bad plumbing, and even a few squirrels nests within the walls and even the HVAC system itself, which was an especially nutty discovery. Get it? Squirrels? Nuts? I’ll pause for laughter.

The photo above is the living room on the LEFT side of the duplex (you can see more before photos in our original duplex tour) And below is what that room is looking like now. The hardwood floors look extra dusty at the moment, but they should clean up just as nicely as the ones at the pink house. And on that day I’ll dance on them like no one is watching.

Jumping over to the other side of the duplex, this was the living room on the RIGHT side when we bought it… which appeared to have slightly less water issues and mold.

…and here’s the same shot after demo. We lost some walls, but gained some ladders apparently. And we discovered some pretty impressive rot spots on that right-hand wall, along with some framing that will need to be reinforced in the name of safety. No squirrels living on this side though.

And one last “before and after” comparison before we move on to floor planning. Here’s a shot of the kitchen on the right side, which was located in a side porch that was enclosed at some point. Fun fact: if you listen to the podcast, this is the area where water started gushing out of the walls when we turned on the water meter. But this photo is from before that happened, so the discolored/rotten spots on the floor came with the house.

This is the same area after demo, where you can see some of the crazy, not-at-all-to-code structural stuff that was lurking behind those old walls. It looks kinda like someone built that back wall out of scrap wood they had laying around, so it’s a miracle it was staying up at all!

We have more photos for you, but the best way to get the full tour is through the video below (or here on YouTube), where Sherry points out a lot of the floor plan changes we’re considering, along with some strange things that were uncovered during demo. We’re going to do a follow-up post with an actual floor plan soon, but we’re still finalizing a couple of things.

For anyone who who doesn’t have time to watch the video at the moment, I’d definitely recommend coming back to watch it (a video tour is worth a thousand words and pics) but here’s some of what’s covered.

One update we’re excited about is opening up the entryway on each side, so that the stairs are a lot less closed off. We’re going to take that wall back several studs so that the side of the stairs are more open, so they become more connected to the living room and less of a dark, narrow vestibule.

To give you a better idea, here’s the view from within the living room. Don’t quote me on exactly how far back the wall will be opened, but that yellow line gives you a sense of the new opening we’re aiming for (and I added a white line to show where a railing would go). You know, something like this inspiration picture.

Another big functional change downstairs is that we’ll be adding a powder room/half bathroom. Originally both sides just had one full bathroom upstairs, assuming you don’t count the random toilet by the back door on the right side (it wasn’t behind a door or anything, it just kinda sat a few steps from the kitchen sink!). So we’re turning the former closet under the stairs into a half bathroom with a proper sink, toilet, and even a door. Imagine that!

The only other doorway we’re widening (in addition to the side-wall-of-the-stairs that we mentioned above) is between the living room and what will become the kitchen, which we believe was previously used as a dining space. We’re going to put the dining table at the far end of the living room instead, meaning we can create a larger and more spacious kitchen in that back room. And the wider doorway (which I’ve marked below in yellow) will help it to feel less closed off and more light-filled.

For the kitchen itself, we’re planning to put the sink across that back wall under the window (we’ll be switching out that window with a slightly less long one so cabinets can pass below it) and then we plan to continue the cabinetry along the entire right kitchen wall, where we’ll also put the stove and fridge. And yes, we’re psyched to have found that brick chimney behind the walls and plan to keep it exposed!

Like the yellow kitchen you saw above, here’s the original galley-style kitchen on the left side, in all of its orange glory. And true to form, it was also shoved into what used to be a former side porch.

Here’s what it’s looking like now, which we’re planning to use as a multi-functional space to house the washer and dryer, more cabinetry (think: pantry), and even a small mudroom area since it leads to the back door where the outdoor shower will be.

Just like on the other side, the framing in this section is crazy (you’ll see it better in the video – the studs are oriented the wrong way!) so there’s a chance it will have to be completely rebuilt from scratch. But it’s not like we haven’t already been there and done that with the pink house!

All of the changes I’m describing will be the same on both sides, so I won’t bother going through it twice, but before we move upstairs, I just have to share this one last view we took downstairs on our last visit. This is standing in the left side’s kitchen, looking into the right side. In a few months we won’t be able to see from one side into the other anymore, so we’re relishing views like this while we can. It’s so crazy looking!

Upstairs is kinda confusing to explain, but the main things to take away from this picture is that 1) we’re standing in the front of the house (the front bedroom on the left side) looking towards the back and 2) the bathroom was really disproportionately sized (so long that you could practically put a 5 x 7′ area rug in the middle of it and not touch the shower or the toilet/sink!). So we’re going to steal some of that wasted bathroom space (see the yellow line) to create a small third sleeping nook, sort of in the spirit of the pink house’s bunk room. It won’t be exactly the same (and we’re not certain we’ll do bunks again) but it will create some much needed bonus sleeping space, which is always nice in a vacation house.

The other thing you can see in some of these upstairs photos is just how shallow the roof is. See how there’s basically NO attic up there? Yes, those sloped beams that you see behind the ceiling joists are the actual roof supports! Just a few inches above the ceiling! That’s why we’ve been hankering to increase the pitch as much as possible so that we can try to sneak our upstairs HVAC system up there somewhere – and so when it rains the slope of the roof is a lot more conducive to avoiding leaks thanks to adequate water shedding. Thank goodness the Historic Review Board approved the change to make that happen!

The front bedroom is staying relatively the same layout-wise, but the other notable change in the upstairs is the back bedroom. It used to look like this, with that window overlooking the backyard. But we’re turning that window into a door that will lead to a very small addition to the top floor: another full bathroom.

The downstairs footprint of this house already has a little bump out on the back right there (it’s the area in the future mudroom/pantry/laundry room that leads to the back door) so we’re essentially just continuing that bump out upstairs too. It will give this bedroom an en suite bathroom AND bring both sides from just 1 bathroom to 2.5 bathrooms total. Plus, we already have approval from the Historic Review Board to add that tiny addition along with a new window between the chimney and the old window (which, again, is becoming the bathroom door) so we won’t lose any light in the bedroom. Victory!

Here’s another one of those shots looking through both sides of the house (from the back bedroom on the left side into the one on the right). Again, we’re planning to keep the brick exposed on each side. And fun fact number two: we discovered after demolition that this chimney TWISTS. Notice how it’s angled in the photo below? Scroll up to the kitchen photos and you’ll see that it’s parallel to the walls downstairs. So strange, right? It does this twisting between floors, but you can see it from the kitchen when you look up now that things are demo’d.

Speaking of strange, I still can’t get over how weird it is to see these two mirrored floorplans open to one another – especially where they meet at the stairs. It feels like the moment when American Lindsay Lohan meets the British Lindsay Lohan at summer camp in the Parent Trap and they realize they’ve had a twin all along.

Pretty exciting stuff, eh? Also, I clearly need to work on my squirrel jokes. But in the meantime remember that the video walk-through that we included earlier in this post has a lot more details about the floor plan that we’re leaning towards (along with generally being a lot more orienting than photos can be by nature). So be sure to watch that for more info and priceless quotes like “I don’t think that’s actually pee in there…” There’s a reason why our kids call this the smelly house, but hopefully not for long!

]]>85653https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/02/duplex-demo-tour/#86: How Our Life Together Almost Didn’t Happenhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/YoungHouseLove/~3/Xsm5goakaLk/
Mon, 26 Feb 2018 06:00:27 +0000https://www.younghouselove.com/?p=85635<p>We’re getting personal this week, and sharing some early setbacks and hard choices that almost steered our lives in a totally different direction &#8211; no houses, no blog, even no marriage! We also dive into how some failed attempts at making over a certain area of our home led to us giving up and calling in the pros. Plus, an easy way to up your drawer organization game, and a tool that makes nearly every project easier. You can download this episode from Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, TuneIn Radio, and Spotify – or listen to it below! Then use this page to check out any links, notes, or photos we referenced. Note: If you’re reading in a feed reader, you might have</p>
<p>The post <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/02/podcast-86/">#86: How Our Life Together Almost Didn’t Happen</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com">Young House Love</a>.</p>We’re getting personal this week, and sharing some early setbacks and hard choices that almost steered our lives in a totally different direction – no houses, no blog, even no marriage! We also dive into how some failed attempts at making over a certain area of our home led to us giving up and calling in the pros. Plus, an easy way to up your drawer organization game, and a tool that makes nearly every project easier.

You can download this episode from Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, TuneIn Radio, and Spotify – or listen to it below! Then use this page to check out any links, notes, or photos we referenced. Note: If you’re reading in a feed reader, you might have to click through to the post to see the player.

What’s New

I wish we had prettier photos of the backyard, but these quick shots that we took in the fall are the best we’ll have until things green up in the next month or two. But above you can see our ornamental “sticks” (that one in the front is a ginkgo and the one that’s closer to the shed behind it is a weeping cherry).

Below is a “before” of the yard that we took shortly after we moved in. The big tree that died last summer is the large one to the right of the yellow birdbath, which resulted in the whole arc of the yard being pushed back a bit more. It’s really nice to have a larger yard that’s less pinched towards the house in that area, but we loved that old tree :(

Here’s what that view above looks like lately, after we spent a few years getting grass to grow, finally installed the irrigation system, and had those screening bushes & a few trees planted around the perimeter. You can also see the pea gravel we added under the table to map out where the future patio will go – which also helped us to see that we’d like it to be a little deeper (feels a little narrow right now).

Here’s another view that shows some of the plants better. It’s a good mix of screening bushes, some decorative grasses, and three ornamental trees (we did a maple, a gingko, and a weeping cherry). So eager to see everything green up this spring and fill in over the next few years.

Quick Tip

Our junk drawer (above) is a good example of how we use containers + velcro strips to compartmentalize things. You can even see how affixing the boxes in a certain way created extra storage zones without necessitating even more containers (like where the tape, stapler, and red flashlight are stored).

Update

If you missed our original discussion about the backward book trend, you can check it out in last week’s episode (Episode #85).

Our Early Setbacks

As promised, here are some video tours of our first apartments (taken years before we had a blog!), starting with Sherry’s NYC studio that she moved into after her breakup. This was 2005, so she shot this on a basic point-and-shoot camera to send to her friend. My favorite part is what she had in the fridge.

Next up is the Upper West Side apartment in NYC that I moved into with friends shortly after Sherry and I started dating. Again, this was a tour she shot to send to her friend. Phrases like “we did a blue and brown theme in the bathroom” had us laughing out loud when we watched this back:

And last is our first apartment together in Richmond, VA after we moved from NYC in early 2006 (still over a year and a half before we started blogging). I remember that fax machine on the floor like it was yesterday – and how having our own washer and dryer thrilled us to no end. At least the fridge has actual food in it by this point in our lives.

And here’s the 5-book Selection series that Sherry is gaga for (marked down from $49 to $29). Since we recorded she has barreled through two more of the books and there’s no sign of stopping her anytime soon.

And lastly, a big thank you to HANDy Paint Products for sponsoring this episode. If you’ve got a painting project coming up, we personally love the HANDy Paint Cup (with the little brush magnet) and the HANDy Paint Tray, which makes moving your roller around the room so much easier. You can find all of the bright red HANDy Paint Products wherever you buy paint.

]]>85635https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/02/podcast-86/How We Made Built-In Bunk Beds At The Beach Househttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/YoungHouseLove/~3/NWt_ZXVx4gw/
Wed, 21 Feb 2018 16:34:40 +0000https://www.younghouselove.com/?p=85554<p>The built-in bunk beds at the beach house are complete (!!) and I&#8217;m excited to share with you guys how we created them. Although, it should be noted that my excitement pales in comparison to our kids&#8217; when they saw the much-talked-about bunks finally become a reality. And if I&#8217;m being totally honest, I was a little nervous about this project. This was our first time building bunk beds, which felt significantly more high stakes than, say, building a bookcase or a table. This is a bed that literally FLOATS IN THE AIR so one person can sleep ON TOP OF ANOTHER PERSON (or the occasional chihuahua). But my nerves are calmed by the fact that</p>
<p>The post <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com/2018/02/built-in-bunk-beds/">How We Made Built-In Bunk Beds At The Beach House</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.younghouselove.com">Young House Love</a>.</p>The built-in bunk beds at the beach house are complete (!!) and I’m excited to share with you guys how we created them. Although, it should be noted that my excitement pales in comparison to our kids’ when they saw the much-talked-about bunks finally become a reality.

And if I’m being totally honest, I was a little nervous about thisproject. This was our first time building bunk beds, which felt significantly more high stakes than, say, building a bookcase or a table. This is a bed that literally FLOATS IN THE AIR so one person can sleep ON TOP OF ANOTHER PERSON (or the occasional chihuahua).

But my nerves are calmed by the fact that we’re extremely happy with how it turned out, and how extremely sturdy they are (Sherry and I have been up on the top bunk together and it’s solid as a rock). It wasn’t exactly a straight line getting to the end product, so I wanted to share the process so you can file this post next to the hundreds of others currently on Pinterest. #bunkwagon

This space is pretty unique in that it was the perfect width for wall-to-wall twin XL mattresses. The room is exactly 81.5″ wide and a twin XL is 80″, so there’s just enough wiggle room to comfortably tuck in a sheet or bedspread. Having known that early on in renovating this house, we decided pretty quickly that this would be a perfect spot for extra long bunks. Adding some overflow sleeping space + novelty-factor for any kiddos who stay here (including our own bunk-obsessed offspring) = no brainer. But for the last three months, it pretty much looked like this:

A few weekends ago we finally got to the “build the bunk beds” line item on our to-do list, and we hauled a bunch of 2 x 4″ boards all the way from Richmond to Cape Charles, along with some pieces of plywood and a lot of heavy duty screws. We started with the bottom bunk which we decided to build directly on the floor to maximize headroom for each bed. Note: After some debate, we nixed the idea of any under bed storage for simplicity’s sake, and because we didn’t want the raise the bed too much off the floor for younger sleepers like our son. We’ll be adding some drawer storage elsewhere in the room.

We later changed our minds (surprise!) and decided to raise the bottom bunk a few more inches off the floor (not high enough for any drawers to make sense or anything), but you’ll see how we redid this platform in a bit. But for now, pretend you’re blissfully unaware of that change. Ah construction, you unpredictable animal.

The advantage of this room is that we could attach three of the platform’s four sides directly into wall studs, which gave us a HUGE amount of confidence in the sturdiness of this contraption. So once I had those first three 2×4″s around the perimeter cut and secured into studs with long screws, we cut three short pieces to create some cross bracing under the platform, which you can see below. We’d go back and add more later on, but again – you’re blissfully unaware of that for now.

Since I don’t own a framing nailer, I attached all of these using my Kreg Jig. It makes pocket holes in your wood that allow you to join pieces really tightly together. I’ve lost count of how many projects I’ve used it for at this point, so I highly recommend one.

Once the cross-braces were attached, I attached the fourth side of my frame across the front. I’m no framing expert, but I assume a lot of people would just build the complete frame to size, slide it into place, and secure it to the wall last. We debated this, but we trusted ourselves to get a more precise fit (we really wanted this thing supremely snug to the wall) if we built it in place instead.

With the framing completed, we nailed down some planks of 1/2″ plywood to create a solid surface for the mattress to rest on. We used small 2 x 4′ plywood sheets because they’re the largest we could fit in the car with everything else we were trekking to the beach house, so my 2 x 4″ cross-braces were placed to make sure each plywood edge rested on the frame. Again, I’d go back later and add more support under the middle of each section.

Next, we brought in the bottom mattress so we could figure out how high we wanted the second bunk. This was our main criteria in deciding that height:

We wanted the headroom roughly equal on both bunks

BUT we wanted it cramped enough on the top bunk to discourage horseplay / jumping / attempts to stand up

AND we wanted enough room on the bottom bunk for an adult to sit up without knocking their nogging (think: during storytime)

Long story short – we cheated the top bunk a little higher than halfway to accomplish #2 and #3. I’ll give you all of the final measurements at the end of the post, since this is before we moved up the bottom bunk a few more inches later.

We followed the same process for the upper bunk, but with some adjustments that we learned from constructing the lower one. For one, we added some extra cross bracing to make sure the upper platform was extremely solid. And we broke out these heavy duty “Rugged Structural Strength” screws to secure it to the wall. We read about them in this bunk bed tutorial and my ears perked up at the idea of a “lag screw alternative” that I could install with my regular driver. They. Are. Awesome.

Installing them still took a little bit of oomph (check out that lunge!) especially to make sure all of my 2 x 4″ boards pulled tight into the stud, but it was so much simpler than dealing with bulky lag screws. No pilot holes needed, and my regular ol’ electric driver did the trick. We joke that a hoard of wild elephants could stampede this house and the only thing that would remain standing would be these bunks. I’m not saying I know for a fact that they’re elephant-proof, but I’m pretty confident they are…

Again, the process for making the upper platform was the same as the lower – just more cross braces (one every 12 inches-ish) and we used those heavy duty screws to secure all of the 2 x 4″ boards to the wall (right into the studs on the back and both side walls), as well as to secure the front piece to the rest of the frame.

If those Rugged Strength Screws are the heroes of this build, then these bar clamps are the Robin to their Batman. They were a huge help in keeping things in place while we worked on attaching them.

It eventually got too dark outside for us to cut the upper plywood to size so it would rest flush against the floating platform we had built (which is why you can see the plywood under the top mattress in this picture overlapping), but we threw some full pieces up there so we could at least check out how it would look with the two mattresses in place. Thaaaaaaat’s when we realized we didn’t like the heights. ::facepalm::

While we’d accomplished exactly what we were going for with the top bunk height (even small kids can’t jump around up there since it’s too close to the ceiling for those sorts of acrobatics), we had overcompensated in our attempt to make the bottom bunk-gap a bit more generously sized than the top, and they looked more uneven than we intended (plus now a kid could jump on the bottom bed, which could also result in some serious head smacking – d’oh!).

So we decided to raise the bottom platform a little bit since we also concluded it would look nicer to not be so close to the floor. This also makes it more comfortable for an adult to sit on that bottom bed and read a story without feeling like they’re crouched super low to the ground. Again, I’ll share final measurements at the end of this post, but we’ve been really happy with how everything turned out since we made the adjustment. I’ll jump ahead one more time to show you the final proportions of everything:

Bright and early the next morning we deconstructed the bottom platform enough that we could re-secure it a little bit higher off the floor (this also gave us the chance to add a bit more cross support under the plywood). There’s a lot going on in the photo below, so don’t hurt yourself trying to decipher it. Just know that we added some scrap 2 x 4″s along the floor so we’d have a place to nail in the baseboard, and since we had cut some “legs” to attach those baseboard-holding boards, we also took the opportunity to add some support legs in the middle for good measure too. Even though the platform was fully secured to the wall, we figured why not!

So with the bottom platform fixed, we finally turned back to cutting that plywood for the upper bunk to size and attaching it. It was also a chance to put my money where my mouth was (or my body where my build was?) and prove to Sherry that this puppy wasn’t going anywhere. Later when Sherry was up there with me building the railing, we felt pretty great that our combined weight (nearly 300 pounds!) was no sweat for this floating platform.

On our next trip to Cape Charles we brought the wood for the trim and the railings, which is when these started to look more like built-in bunks. It really just took some pre-primed 1 x 8″ boards nailed into place over the exposed frames to dress things up, along with reinstalling the baseboard trim across the bottom.

We were working off of these bunk beds from Studio McGee as our inspiration for the railing. We liked how clean-lined they were and the mix of wood and white was nice too. We thought the X-pattern along the top rail might be a little busy in such a small room (and harder to accomplish), but everything else gave us a good starting point.

We bought a bunch of 2 x 2″ square pine boards at Home Depot to work with and we started with the ladder first. We cut the 18″ wide rungs in groups to try to keep the cut size exact for each step. Here it is laid out on the hallway floor.

To secure it together we used long 5″ Rugged Strength Screws through the side rail into each rung. We didn’t have a clamp that would hold things together, so we made sure I was working on a flat surface (some scrap MDF leftover from the pantry project) and could press everything against the wall to keep it in place as I screwed things in. Also, note the “blocks” that Sherry cut and put between each rung to keep things spaced evenly (our rungs are 12″ apart from top to top, so the spacers were 10.5″). I also used another scrap piece of wood that I rested on top and pressed down to keep everything flush as I drove in the screw.

Once it was constructed we clamped the ladder into place and began mapping out the other parts of the railing, since they’d all be visually connected. Again – clamps are the trusty sidekick of this project.

After we attached the ladder to the bunks (using more 5″ RSS screws) we realized the 2 x 2″ rungs were a little small – like your foot felt like it needed more surface area to rest on. So we cut longer pieces and attached them on the front of each rung (screwing them in from the backside) to make each platform deeper (and much more comfortable). We also sanded all the corners of the wood so they are more like a rounded square edge as opposed to a super sleek sharp one.

We secured the top rails from the topside with more RSS screws. Pictured below is the tiny top rail on the wall side of the ladder. Normally we would’ve just put the ladder right against the wall, but it would have interfered with the light switch, so we floated it off a couple of inches – which is actually nice because when you hold the side of the ladder there’s room for your hands to wrap around it. Worked out really well.

We attached the lower horizontal rail across that upper bunk using pocket holes from the backside, so they’re not visible from the front. And speaking of visible from the front – if I did it again, I’d probably make it so those two screw heads couldn’t be seen. Part of us thinks it’s kind of a nice little detail (they’re industrial looking and brass in color, so they’re almost like gold rivets that are also visible along the sides of the ladder). But when viewed at angles like the one below, only 2 are visible, so it looks more random than it does from the other corner of the room. We could’ve avoided those being visible by screwing it into place from the backside, so that’s an option if you’re going for a more seamless look.

Oh and as for the underside of that top bunk, it’s just some thin 1/4″ plywood sheets that we glued and nailed into place, and then trimmed out with some primed lattice strips to cover the seam in the middle. This angle shows more of how the ladder has those brass screws running down the side, so they look pretty neat when you see them all lined up en masse like that.

Not to jump ahead, but we thought the brass screw heads looked even cooler once everything was stained.

Actually, speaking of staining – this past weekend we were finally able to finish up the project with caulk, paint (Sherwin Williams Pure White), and stain (more on exactly what we used in a second – we still need to seal it next time we’re back). If you follow us on Instagram you saw in our InstaStories that it took a fair amount of stain testing to get a color that was similar to the floors and doors. But once we landed on the right color, we taped everything off and got to work.

Sherry brushed on a coat of Minwax Natural on all of the cut ends. The raw cut ends of wood boards tend to absorb WAY more stain, making them darker in the end, so we used a lighter color on them instead.

Then we did a coat of Minwax Puritan Pine everywhere else using a brush. Once it set for around 15 minutes, we wiped off the excess.

After all that, it wasn’t quite red enough, so we did a quick coat of Minwax Colonial Maple everywhere using a rag to give it a slight reddish cast.

Despite being a little bit complex, we’re really happy with how it turned out. It’s not a perfect match, but it certainly feels right within the family of the 100-year-old pine floor tones. Victory! And when it comes to how much we spent, we’d estimate it was around $250 total.

Like I said at the start, these have quickly become the kids’ favorite spot in the house. And actually, one of Burger’s too. He has discovered that the sun sweeps through here throughout the day, creating several dog-friendly hot spots on the bed and floor. He even graced us with his presence while we were snapping pics… and then promptly started grooming himself.

Beyond the bunks, the room itself needs a bit more work. We’re keeping an eye out for the right dresser or cabinet to add a little bit of storage (and surface area) to the opposite wall. Then we might add a cozy rug, and maybe some fun paint color on the ceiling?

I also promised final measurements, so here they are all in one place for you:

Bottom bunk: Top of the platform is 10″ off the ground, making the mattress 17″ off the ground, with 34.5″ of headroom

Top bunk: Top of platform is 56″ off the ground, making the mattress 63″ off the ground, with 32.5″ of headroom

Ladder rungs are 18″ wide making the full ladder 21″ wide from edge to edge. Rungs are 12″ apart from top to top.

Top railing is 7″ above the mattress top (5″ is required) with a 3″ gap between the two

Okay, and in the end, the entire process was around 88% less nervewracking than I thought. Basically, child’s play compared to building a deck or installing an irrigation system. Which is a very good thing, because our most recent plans for the duplex have a similar spot for bunks, so we may have two more sets of these in store for ourselves. Better buy my weight in those gold screws.